SVG Sit-Down: EA SPORTS' Evan Dexter on How the EA SPORTS Madden NFL Cast' Blends Gaming and Live NFL ProductionPeacock's Thanksgiving-night broadcast will blend videogame elements, NFL actionBy Brandon Costa, Director of Digital Monday, November 17, 2025 - 2:51 pm
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With the EA SPORTS Madden NFL Cast returning Thanksgiving night on Peacock, NBC Sports and EA SPORTS are again pushing the boundaries of how football is presented and consumed. The alternative broadcast, produced in collaboration with the NFL and Genius Sports, will merge live action from the Cincinnati Bengals-Baltimore Ravens matchup with real-time data overlays and visual elements inspired by the Madden NFL videogame series.
For Evan Dexter, VP, franchise strategy and marketing, American football, EA SPORTS, this project represents more than a creative experiment: it indicates how gaming and live-broadcast production are converging.
[Football's] live-broadcast and gaming leadership have been emulating each other for a very long time. The Madden NFL Cast is the official integration of the two in ways that just haven't been done before.
Dexter sat down with SVG to discuss the vision behind the Madden NFL Cast, the choice to shoot primarily from the SkyCam perspective, and how EA SPORTS continues to honor John Madden's legacy while shaping the next generation of football storytelling.
What does the Madden NFL Cast represent in EA SPORTS' broader vision for how fans experience your brand and football videogaming?
Madden and its properties have, for so many years, crept into the authentic football world to the point where we started to see, over the last five, 10, 15 years, football on TV trying to replicate Madden. The sport's live-broadcast and gaming leadership have been coming together in a way that both have been emulating each other for a very long time. The Madden NFL Cast is the official integration of the two in ways that just haven't been done before.
The decision to use the SkyCam as the primary angle brings the Madden perspective directly to air. What's your take on how that changes the way a viewer reads the game. How did your side and NBC Sports come together?
Yeah, it was meant to be a part of it last year. We started out last year with, I think, eight or nine core creative concepts that we wanted to represent Madden Cast as a whole. But, because it was new to us and relatively new to NBC, they had done alternate casts before but not the way we wanted to execute it. Because of our partnership with NBC, Genius, and EA, we were stumbling through the testing process last year and trying to preserve as many of those eight or nine original core concepts as we could. We just ran out of time because of the R&D required to get NBC's production set up and ready to go. One of the things we ran out of time on was the SkyCam.
What are some of those other core concepts that you mentioned will be making it into this year's production?
There's a couple. The big one I'm excited about - again, something we ran out of time for last year - is pre-snap ratings matchups, like line-of-scrimmage ratings matchups. That was part of the original vision of what we wanted to achieve with Madden Cast. We started down that path last year, and we're going to be much further down the road this year using data and assets specific to our game to put on screen narratives that don't require an analyst or commentator.
You can imagine that a 98-overall wide receiver matched up against an 80-overall defensive back is instantly intuitive to a viewer: there's something to watch, a pre-narrative that might unfold in an interesting way. It's part of that chess game between offense and defense. If we can visualize, before the ball snaps, where the most interesting matchups are purely based on ratings, it gives viewers the ability to establish a little bit of a sub-narrative and watch it unfold in a way they might not have otherwise - unless they're a hyper-core fan who knows every name, number, and skill level on the field.
Use of augmented-reality graphics is happening a lot across the NFL. How does Madden carve out a unique identity in a space where lots of people are trying to figure out how AR can tell the best stories in a live production?
I think of it as the difference between alternate versus augmented. We're the only brand trying to augment football, whereas a lot of other brands - like The Simpsons, Toy Story, or Nickelodeon - are trying to alternate football for different audiences. What we're doing is an attempt to make the viewership experience better and more data-immersive for existing football fans, as opposed to leveraging outside IP to attract new ones.
From EA's standpoint, how do you balance innovation with respect for the game's core emotions and stories? There's emotion and intensity in players, coaches, and the stadium environment that maybe doesn't come across in a videogame. How do you creatively balance what you can do technologically with what, from a human standpoint, viewers still want?
The way I think about it is, everything that we're integrating from the game into broadcast should be augmentative: it should supplement the viewing experience, not distract from it. It should feel like more data available to you.
Where we landed well last year - and I'm even more excited about it this year because we've got an even better cast - was in the analysis. Kurt Benkert was one of the most well-received components of last year's Madden Cast because he brings such a deep level of analysis and predictiveness. His post-play breakdowns are at a level we've seen only with guys like Tony Romo. Kurt not only can dissect what's happening in front of him b
